


the truth of our sins

by fraldarian, SydneyHorses



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Alternate Universe - Historical, Childhood Trauma, Dissociation, Explicit Sexual Content, Haphephobia, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Mutual Pining, Slow Burn, Violence, privateers
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-26
Updated: 2020-08-13
Packaged: 2021-03-04 07:08:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 19,128
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24919594
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fraldarian/pseuds/fraldarian, https://archiveofourown.org/users/SydneyHorses/pseuds/SydneyHorses
Summary: It's the Imperial Year 1830, and Felix Fraldarius is part of a famed privateer crew contracted by King Dimitri. War has long since crossed the horizon, and with a stalemate drawing near, the Alliance and Kingdom join forces. With a king gone mad and an Alliance leader that has yet to show face, The Venatio spends its precious time left ransacking Imperial settlements and vessels at sea.Sylvain Gautier is a vigilante on the run, disregarded from a wealthy merchant family who oversees the northernmost territory. Known as the Red Cardinal by those who see fit, a feathered mask and a scabbard at his side are what make up the entirety of his little possessions. When it comes clear he's been residing in The Crossroads, a black market located deep within Gautier territory, his head becomes wanted.It's interesting how fate can bring souls together.
Relationships: Felix Hugo Fraldarius/Sylvain Jose Gautier
Comments: 15
Kudos: 50





	1. i. - never more than a wolf at your door

It’s the Imperial Year 1830, and Felix Hugo Fraldarius has a blunderbuss poised to fire at the crisp sky. There’s a cry from above, a shift of movement along the edge of the mast, the flap of wings and the gleam of a coin pouch against slanted sun’s rays.

“Shoot it, Fraldarius!” There’s a rough voice to his left. It’s Raphael Kirsten, the victim of a petty thieving involving a gull now perched high above, gloating in all its might.

“Shut up. I'm _going_ to.” There’s the glint of a canine catching on a bottom lip, and then the gunner turns back to his task at hand, squinting through narrowed eyes as he lines up the gun perfectly.

The two of them aren’t alone. Annette is there, frown leaving deep lines upon a porcelain face as she stands off to the side. Cast off amongst the curling shadows of a deck is their boatswain, Yuri. He looks about as unimpressed as Annette, fair features drawn down in a look of exasperation. Their captain, Leonie Pinelli, isn’t anywhere to be found, and Felix can’t help but feel a twinge of relief. He doesn’t need to get an earful from her on this already beguiling day.

It had begun fairly early that morning. There’d been a tugging of sheets, a hand nearly severed by a hidden dagger under feathered pillows, and the sharp yell of Ingrid. Flaxen hair and china skin, dark blue eyes drawn wide in a sense of trivial alarm.

“You have to do something, Felix.” Her voice had been edging on the border of maddening hysteria and a fatiguing exasperation. But the dagger had still been held precariously in front of them, gloved hands poised to strike above a lithe wrist as if an Imperial intruder had made home above Felix.

“Don’t touch me.” His voice had been little more than a venomous shrilling, had let a bottom lip curl to expose clenched teeth. But he’d risen regardless, once foreign hands left narrowed shoulders and a dagger no longer turned leathered knuckles bone white.

“Raphael was robbed.” There’s a frown carving across her face as if Felix’s poniard had done it itself. It’s not a good look for her, never has been. Fraldarius thought it brought out far too many wrinkles; such things never were decent for any individual.

“Robbed? How the hell are you _robbed_ on a _ship_?” With an air of incredulity Felix is shifting the dagger back underneath a well-worn pillow, presses thin lips into an even thinner line and rises on chiming boots.

“It – wasn’t someone onboard.” Galatea looks positively conscience-stricken, eyes cast downwards to avoid the serrated gaze of Fraldarius’s eyes boring against her temple. “He had it strewn around his breeches. A gull plucked it. Leclerc refuses to engage with it. Constance and I don’t want to disturb the arms stash.”

There’d been a scuffle, sharp retorts, and eventually Fraldarius had grabbed the blunt butt of his blunderbuss and slung it over his shoulder. A crowd had already formed on the main deck, the gentle rock of the brig over lolling waves causing them to sway in the early season’s sun.

Hoisting it so that it’s level with his right eye, Fraldarius frowns, squints once before loading the poised weapon and lights the caliber barrel located at the front of its muzzle. There’s a fizzing as the line draws, and then a spark, a flare of light, and an ear-splitting crack rips through the once tranquil air.

The gull plummets to the wooden deck beneath it, white down turning crimson. Along with it comes the cracking of timber, and then the top of the mast follows through, lands, and punches a hole through an unlucky barrel tossed aside.

“ _Fraldarius!_ ” There’s a sharp cry that punctures already ringing eardrums, and the gunner turns, finds himself staring at a wrathful Leonie that seems reminiscent of veracious sirens underneath the sea’s waves.

“What.” He’s still standing there, the smell of gunpowder upon his nose and a faint dusting upon his cheeks and sleek hair. Whereas Raphael and Ingrid back up, Felix stays put, matches Pinelli’s vengeful stare tenfold.

“You just _broke_ a fucking mast.” If Felix is lucky, he’ll get off with only a minor scuff and a night on slop. If he isn’t, there’s always the watery depths underneath. Fraldarius hopes he can still swim with breeches and ruffled blouse.

So instead he shifts, sizing Raphael up once. He’s tall, with muscles bulging and a shirt that nearly bursts at the seams. But his mind lacks the strength of character that his fists carry, and Felix is nearly certain he could take the man head-on and win. “Kirsten got his brooch picked by that gull. Lucky it wasn’t his ass instead.” Fraldarius motions to the dead bird, neck contorted in an obvious fracture and warm blood oozing from its outstretched beak. “They wanted me to shoot it. I did.”

“Do you see what you’ve done to _my_ ship?” Leonie’s hazel eyes are wide, framed with freckles and ginger hair. It makes her seem a little more daunting than she would any other day. Her sleeves are drawn up, revealing muscled forearms underneath. She was unmatched when it came to a fight based upon fists and chipped knuckles.

“Yeah.” _The Venatio,_ as the brig was called, now sailed with its third mast broken at the head. It was minimal in repair, but the cost would be a pretty penny at the nearest port over. But instead of paying attention to Leonie, Felix intrepidly pivots on a polished boot, makes his way over the mangled animal and places his heel against its warped neck. “Look. It’s dead. Come get your gold.”

Raphael hesitates, looks between the gunner and his captain, then creeps forward on boots that try valiantly to be quiet but bear fruitless. With a careless kick to the pouch, Felix slides it across the deck in the other man’s direction, frowns when Kirsten picks it up and turns away without so much as a thanks. The whole lot of them were left overawed by the silent standoff now cracking like a leather whip between the two privateers. Felix couldn’t blame Raphael for not wanting to utter even a single word.

It hadn’t taken long for Leonie’s presence to snap the rest of the crew into motion. With rigs taut and a steady 10 knots gained upon the open waters, Felix had resorted to cleaning the mess left by a stray blunderbuss and a broken gull.

He’s in the lower quarters. There’s stale water in a bucket, settles it between thighs and lets sumptuous gloves slide haltingly from lithe fingers.

It’s not that Fraldarius had scars along his hands. They’re porcelain, primed and clean and the fairest of cream. But there’s a vulnerability that hangs thick in the air; there wasn’t a soul onboard that would dare interrupt the gunner at a time like this. Not when they were submerged in water’s depths, not when the contents of the bucket had now become a washed out pink.

Except for Annette Dominic, with fair skin and freckled cheeks and hair that mimics the licking flames of a lamp lit by whale’s fat. She’s sitting some feet behind him, and if it were anyone else, a poniard would have been aimed at their jugular and a projection of crimson would spill to the wooden boards beneath.

“I heard from Leonie and Lysithea that we’re headed to one of the northern ports. They know a carpenter that excels at masting ships.” Delicate hands are folded neatly against her dress, flowing like robes down her legs and pillows between her thighs.

“I don’t much care.” His voice sounds dismissive, edges on annoyance, but perhaps the thing that truly gets to Fraldarius is that both of them know he doesn’t mean it. Annette always had a way of knowing the meaning behind the gunner’s false words and false staccatos.

“Have you heard? Apparently, we are to dock at the port overseen by the merchant Gautier. I wonder what’s become of their blackmarket.” She’s too busy teasing a fraying string to notice the tightening of her company’s shoulders, too busy to notice the way Felix’s eyes have narrowed reminiscent to sharpened daggers.

“Interesting.” Thin lips are pursed, once, before pressing them into a line. “Haven’t been there in a while.”

Annette doesn’t understand nor catch the venom laced behind the words, and why would she? Fraldarius keeps his history and past life locked up, as if an impenetrable fortress. There isn’t a key to it; there’s never been one. So instead she laughs, lets the tinkering tune fill the space and fill the gunner’s ears. “Oh, Felix! Of _course_ it’s been a while. I wasn’t even part of the crew at that point. When was it? Four years ago?”

“Five. It was five years ago.” And he knows this, knows it by heart, because it was when he joined _The Venatio._ It was also, inexplicably, where an eighteen-year-old Felix had left the ghost of a boy who no longer existed.

Felix is ten when the stench of vomit clings to a teen no more than three years his senior, is ten when a sob fills the air and there’s another spasm throughout his company’s muscles. Ten when Glenn soils himself for the tenth time that day, ten when the fever breaks out and elastosis takes over. Once taut skin sags, wrinkles and misshapes until a brother previously fourteen now seemingly ages seven times his natural years. There’s a thirst that cannot be quenched no matter how much water Felix graciously pours into a brother’s mouth, like an oasis.

Felix is ten when he wakes up to a dead boy in the bed next to him.

They say when undergoing a traumatic ordeal, your brain protects itself. Brings up an invisible shield that detaches you from reality. And perhaps, in itself, that is a good thing. It’s better to dissociate then starkly recall the clamminess of pallid skin and the heavy weight of a deceased body tossed against him. Better not to punctuate and remember the smell of day’s old sick that leaves a boy retching in the backroom of a cobbled house. Better not to bring back how it felt to help a broken father carry a dead son strung around a child’s arms and lay him to rest in a barrow outside.

And, in the end, it’s better to wear gloves than touch or be touched. Better not to become depersonalised, better not to lose that precious tether between himself and whatever emotion there is.

Felix doesn’t want to feel like the husk of someone who isn’t there to begin with.

He falls asleep later that night. The evening had been spent in the galley, a wooden chalice of aged beer in his gloved palm and whatever minimal cooking Ashe had construed for the crew placed in front of him. The stars had been out, tethered by strings held up by the goddess’s fingers.

He dreams of back alleys and a boy once sixteen resorting to petty theft and by the time he awakes, the ship has been berthed and moored. Yuri and Lysithea are already standing upon the wooden dock, holding precariously a contract signed underneath by the King himself, Dimitri. It gives them the license needed to step foot here, a wordless leverage over the others that proves that perhaps they were not felonious vagrants.

Leonie’s coming up behind him. “Yuri and I are scouting out the whereabouts of the carpenter. I need you to stock up on ammunition powder. Check out what cutlasses and rapiers they have. A saber if you can get your hands on it.” And then a pouch is being tossed in his direction, and Felix raises a hand, snatches it midair and pries it open with a thumb.

Inside are a few gold coins. More than enough to get what he needs on the black market. He knows better than to run off with the leftovers; Pinelli would have him skewed to the ship’s head as a reminder to others. “Yeah. Got it.” And then the gunner’s strapping it around his belt, tucks it away neatly. This port wasn’t one for treating strangers kindly: Fraldarius knew that best. Hopefully the scabbard loose at his side would deter any vagabonds from sizing him as a target of moderate theft. A cutlass through the gut wasn’t a foreign sight to Felix.

The blackmarket is a fair way off, and in the midst of the unending cobblestone streets are the manor’s guards who patrol the thoroughfares. Fraldarius is busy purloining a scrawny apple, slips it into deep pockets and is making his way out from the back end of a stall when he picks up on the conversation at hand.

“… Hear he was spotted out last night. Dupuis couldn’t see his face, said it was obscured by a mask.” They’re situated by the side corner of a tavern outside, a dagger driven into the middle of a shoddily drawn face of a man. Above his head, reads this:

**WANTED**

**The Red Cardinal**

_Payment of 500 gold for capturing alive._

There isn’t much outstanding about the sketch, and if Fraldrius is being honest, he looks like any other commoner upon the streets. Perhaps, the thing that draws him in the most is the mask strung upon his neck. It had the most detail placed into it, and if Felix was to draw two and two together, he would realize the artist had never actually _seen_ the vigilante’s face. Red hair and an ornate mask decorated by ornamental feathers were the only true defining features. Such an individual would be a dead giveaway to a passerby if he were to wear it in the light of daytime. Perhaps that is why it was a keepsake only dressed in at night; Fraldarius could call that a smart enough move.

Showing your face was more dangerous around these parts anyways. It was better to be known for the looks of a mask than the grooves of fine skin.

The blackmarket is in a discarded part of the port town. They call it The Crossroads, and those who don’t tread the infested, mud-laden alleys refer to it as a cesspool for the devil’s tempters. Which, perhaps, isn’t far off from the initial truth. It’s the part of the territory that Gautier frowns upon, has tried to disband for however many decades he’s been in power as the ruling merchant. Such people have a way of growing cruel when the money within the economy doesn’t fall into their own, grubby hands.

Felix hates them.

He’s at a stall that’s carrying expensive, foreign goods. There’s a rapier from the east of Faerghus, a cutlass derived from Almyran territory that produces a carved wyvern into its handle. A blunderbuss catches Felix’s attention: Ornately detailed, the head of a lion upon its butt that rears up in what appears to be the stance of a bellow. The kingdom’s national treasure, its pride in battle, an animal that hasn’t walked this continent at all in all its history, and yet still appears important to the royal family.

“How much for this.” Felix still has it cradled in his palms, is looking up at the merchant in front of him with a cool air.

“Forty gold. Cost me a pretty amount. Discounted just for you.” Fraldarius knows the peddler, of course. Knows most of them here, despite not having roamed these rickety streets in half a decade.

There’s a moment of silence. Felix purses his lips, looking down at the weapon, and then buries a hand into the small pouch inside the inner-edge of his belt and pulls out the necessary coins. “Take them.” And then, with dominant hand slinging the unloaded blunderbuss across a lithe shoulder, the gunner continues on.

By the time he’s back, it’s sundown, and the third mast looks fairly unscathed. It’s nothing pretty, nothing eyeworthy, but it’ll do. It’ll have to do. They have merchant vessels they need to attend to and see the ransacking of.

“Where did you get that?” It’s Ingrid, reclining against the railings of the ship’s main deck. Leonie is nowhere in sight, and neither is Raphael. It’s nothing surprising to the crewmembers; Pinelli was widely known for her alcohol-induced tendencies that found her spending evenings in portside taverns. She’d be gone for a while longer yet.

“Crossroads. Forty gold.” He’s leaning beside her now, though still a few feet away.

“With whose money? The coins the captain loaned you?” Ingrid’s frowning again, and that in itself causes Fraldarius to scowl. She shouldn’t be looking at him like that.

“Yeah. And? Pinelli told me to buy refined weapons. I _did._ ” And truthfully, Fraldarius isn’t wrong. He’d came back adorned with a new cutlass, another carved poniard that would work well for Leonie herself. “Stop looking at me like that. I know what I’m doing.”

Ingrid’s frowning pauses, but there’s a crease of brows. She looks away regardless when Felix snaps, but the gunner is sure the heat of a serrated glare can still be felt upon the back of the woman’s neck.

As it turns out, the captain is fine with the expensive purchase. If it means there’s more guns stocked at the back of their ship, and if the lead gunner has something to shoot and hold within both hands, then Leonie is content. The rest of what contents reside inside the pouch are returned, and Felix is left to his own devices.

It’s another cloudless night when the ship sets off once more. They’re heading towards southern Faerghus; there’s a skirmish at the border barricading the kingdom from the Empire. Despite being commissioned from King Dimitri himself, there are territories that can be raided: the monarchy doesn’t need to know such plans are in the works. An extra coin never hurt the pockets of the ones who looted it. At least, that was the ideal Felix’s mind followed.

The rest of them are in the galley. Ashe had found fresh ingredients in the market square. Despite the small feast – if you could truly call it that – being over, many had made the decision of staying underneath the main deck and continuing with chalices of wine and the finest beer that privateers could grab hold of.

He’s busy polishing the new blunderbuss he’s bought when the first signs of life show themselves. The gun’s resting upon his nap, idle and still and conserving energy until its time is right. The lion gleams up at Fraldarius from the moonlight reflecting upon it, and he’s about to finally settle it down in the lower quarters when a box shifts and there’s the groan of a barrel.

Already a poniard is being brandished. Not much is different when it comes to this, and Felix is rising from the wooden boards he’d seated himself upon. Vermin were common, and as much as Fraldarius wouldn’t care about any rats finding home upon a ship, they carry disease. The idea of even one breaking into their storage before days out on open water doesn’t seem more appealing to him than it would for anyone else.

There’s the creak of his boot upon a wooden deck, and Felix pauses in his wake, stills in case the rat hears him approach any closer. But there’s no sound, and the possible movement of a rodent fleeing doesn’t make itself clear to his eyes. So again, he continues forth, and as a leathered hand curls around the edge of a box, a dagger strikes down.

Except it’s not a rat. There’s a sharp cry as the serrated blade meets a fleshy palm, drags downwards and cuts into skin and muscle. Already blood is oozing up and down the invader’s wrist, and a second later Felix is launching himself backwards, scrambles for an unloaded gun that isn’t there.

In his wake is a man, adorned in burgundy coats and breeches that rise high above hips. There’s already a smear of crimson against white ruffles, and then a grimace that overcasts hazel eyes turn chapped lips downwards.

Perhaps the thing Felix notices first, however, is the red hair. It looks like a bleeding sky when the sun first rises and last sets.

A moment later the poniard rises, poises to strike.


	2. ii. - i found hope in a heart attack

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sylvain tries to convince Felix that there's more to gain from keeping him alive than there is in killing him. His success in the endeavor is debatable.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi there! this is the first chapter written from me (sydney), and not mars! hope you enjoy~

Like most of Sylvain’s bad ideas, this one had seemed a rather good one at first. 

He’s back in his father’s territory, for reasons he does not especially care to get into at the moment, only to find out there’s a bounty on his head. It’s nothing to sneeze at, either. If he had any allies, he wouldn’t begrudge them for turning him in. Still, it means that he’ll have to act fast if he wants to manage to escape Gautier with his life (again). 

So he does the only natural thing after seeing the wanted posters plastered over the city: sets a couple on fire, grabs one as a memento, and then stows away on the first ship he finds. Now, he’s regretting everything, faced with a dagger pointed at his face and sharp, dangerous eyes looking down at him.

“Wait!” He cries out, throwing his hands into the air, blood streaming down one of them. The cut on his palm isn’t deep, but it stings like hell, and it’s still bleeding freely.

At the sound of his voice, the man in front of him cocks his head to the side, his dark black bangs falling into his eyes. There’s something almost familiar about them, but Sylvain can’t quite place it.

“Take your mask off,” the man snaps. The poniard in his hand points itself a little more squarely at his face, and Sylvain swallows.

“Shouldn’t you buy me dinner first?” He asks, a teasing lilt to his voice. 

The man in front of it doesn’t seem to enjoy it, his eyes narrowing. “I’m not going to ask again.”

Sylvain sighs. He’s going to get blood on his mask, isn’t he? “Men these days,” he mutters, reaching up with a bloody palm to untie the ribbon keeping the mask on his head. He pulls it off and brings it down carefully to rest in his lap.

The other man’s breath hitches sharply, almost wounded. “Fuck.” The dagger wavers slightly before returning to point sharply at his face once more.

The voice is familiar. The hair is familiar. He’s met this man before. He’s sure of it. Sylvain searches his memories for hair like spilled ink and eyes the color of amber glass and comes up with only one possible answer. He squints, evaluating the figure standing before him in the pale moonlight. “Felix?”

“It is you.” Felix doesn’t lower the poniard, but Sylvain is no longer so convinced that he’ll kill him. “Sylvain.”

He smiles crookedly up at Felix from his spot on the ground. “The one and only.”

“What the fuck are you doing here.” It isn’t a question, but then again, nothing Felix has ever said has been one.

Sylvain spreads his arms, encompassing the whole of the ship in the gesture. “Hiding. Running away. Same as you.”

Felix scowls. “Shut it, Gautier.”

Sylvain is a good liar, but he’s not quick enough to hide the slight flinch at being called by his last name. Felix arches an eyebrow, impervious as ever. Or, at least, as good at pretending as ever. It’s hard to tell what does and doesn’t truly bother him.

A lifetime ago, he almost had the trick of it. Now, he’ll be lucky if Felix doesn’t gut him right here.

“So you’re the Red Cardinal?”

“The one and only.” So far no one else has seen him. If he plays this right, he might just be able to get out of this alive. Five years ago, Felix had liked sharp swords and clever insults. Neither of those seem particularly likely to get him anywhere right now. He leans back on his elbows, letting Felix loom over him. One of his knees falls to the side and he looks up at Felix through half-lidded eyes. He doesn’t want to die here. Surely Felix will see reason of some sort.

He doesn’t miss the way that Felix’s eyes dart down to rake over the length of his body. Good. This might just work. “What in Seiros are you doing?”

“Convincing you not to kill me,” Sylvain says evenly.

Felix bares his teeth in a grimace. “What the fuck.” He keeps the dagger trained on him, but it’s no longer so close to Sylvain’s face. That’s at least a small mercy.

“Is it working?” Sylvain’s heart is in his throat, but he smiles up at Felix anyways.

“No,” Felix snarls. “You look ridiculous. Stop making a fool of yourself and sit up.”

Well, it was worth a try. Sylvain sighs and sits back up, a hand still on the hilt of his sword. “It seems we’re at an impasse,” he offers.

Felix laughs, haughty and unimpressed. “An impasse? Of what sort? The way I see it, I’ll tell Captain Pinelli you’re here and we’ll all be rich men. Your father has placed quite a bounty on your safe return.”

“Don’t,” Sylvain says, the word ripping itself from his lips before he can stop it. “Felix.”

Felix swallows. The boat rocks gently, as if in contrast to the tension between the two of them. “It was five years ago. I have no reason to care for you.”

“Please,” Sylvain says. There’s nothing else to say. There’s no words for how badly he doesn’t want to be sent home.

Felix sighs and casts his eyes towards the stars above, muttering something to himself that Sylvain can’t quite catch. “Give me one good reason,” he says. His poniard is mere centimeters from Sylvain’s neck. Felix could slit his throat in one smooth motion and that would be the end of him.

For once, Sylvain’s clever tongue fails him. He’s the Red Cardinal, a vigilante wanted all through Faerghus, and yet he can’t talk himself out of a simple stowaway situation. Pathetic, really. He’s sure his father would agree. Sylvain opens his mouth to protest, to reference a shared childhood, maybe, or just to beg for his life like the useless piece of shit he is.

The poniard in Felix’s hand glints dangerously in the moonlight, the slim blade wickedly sharp. He wonders if Felix will at least have the decency to make it quick. 

“Sails!” The cry from the crow’s nest is loud and all-consuming. Felix’s head snaps up, following the noise. If Sylvain were a little less sentimental, this would be a good time to jump him and try to save his own skin. But Sylvain has always been softer than any son of Gautier should be, and so instead he waits.

Felix turns to look towards the horizon, and there’s the sound of heavy footsteps from below. Sylvain tenses, poised to flee and find somewhere else to hide. Felix’s gaze darts back over to him, and Sylvain swallows. His fate lies entirely in Felix’s hands, and both of them know it.

“I’ll deal with you after,” Felix snaps. “We don’t need to worry about a rat in the midst of a battle. Understand?”

Sylvain’s heart is thudding so loud that it’s practically all he can hear. He nods. “Of course.”

Felix levels a glare at him. “Then you’d better find a good place to hide.”

-

It’s been awhile since Sylvain has been on a ship in the middle of a battle, and the first time he’s ever been on one without being a part of the action. Still, he’s huddled behind a clump of barrels by the stairs down to the lower deck, waiting for it to be over. It feels surreal, listening to the sounds of the fight without being able to see what’s happening.

Felix could be dying out there. Felix could be bleeding to death, or shot, or gutted on the end of a sword, and Sylvain would have no way of knowing.

They’re nothing to each other, of course, not anymore, but still. It’s the principle of the matter. He wants to know if Felix would have turned him in or not. They don’t owe each other a damn thing these days, but he wants to know if Felix has finally managed to kill that last bit of softness.

He rips a piece of his shirt off, grimacing at the sound it makes. Sylvain isn’t particularly worried about the sound; this is a nice shirt, and he wishes it hadn’t come to this. The cut on his hand says otherwise, however, and so he wraps the strip of fabric tightly around his palm. It still stings, but that should at the very least prevent a trail of blood following him wherever he goes.

Now, all that’s left is the waiting. He just has to sit still, not get spotted, and listen to the sounds of blades clashing and people dying not five feet from him. He can hear the dull thud of bodies hitting the ground, the grunts of battle. The other ship is too close now for any canons to be fired, but there’s still blunderbusses, and he can hear the occasional shot ring out.

If he does get seen during this, he’ll end up dead anyways. Besides, the Captain and her people will think he’s someone from the Empire ship, and the Empire merchants will think he’s a privateer. Either way, he’s safe, so long as he doesn’t get caught sticking around after the fight is over.

With that in mind, he stands, revealing himself from behind the barrels and appearing directly in front of one of the Empire guards. She frowns. “Where the fuck did you come from?” She doesn’t wait for an answer before swiping at him with her sword, and it’s all Sylvain can do to avoid the blow.

Sylvain pulls his sword out of its scabbard, rolling his shoulders back and preparing to strike. As much as he prefers to take his targets out in the middle of the night, he’s not bad at hand-to-hand combat. He has years of training with his father’s guards, after all.

As such, it’s no trouble to fall back into the familiar routine of slash, parry, sidestep. It’s like a second nature, and he dispatches the woman with a quick slice into her chest. It’s not his prettiest kill, but he’s still alive, and that’s what truly matters.

Against his better judgement, he looks up, surveying the whole scene instead of his immediate vicinity. His eyes go to Felix, unsurprisingly, and as soon as he finds him amidst the chaos, it’s impossible to look away.

Felix moves like the sea when he fights, all liquid grace and refined death. Felix has always been a strong fighter, even when they were children, but he’s matured into something truly deadly. Sylvain doesn’t know how anyone dares to approach him, but these guards must be either well-paid or stupid. Possibly both.

Still, Felix isn’t going to be fast enough. There’s three of them on him now, and although Felix shoots one in the chest and then slashes cleanly through another’s abdomen, there’s still the third, aiming a pistol and cocking it.

Sylvain’s body moves before his mind even registers what’s happening. It’s instinct, to throw himself across the deck of the ship and slash at the enemy woman’s arm. She drops her pistol with a cry, stumbling backwards. Felix whirls around, eyes sharp and dangerous. His gaze skates over Sylvain to the woman, and he steps forward and thrusts his sword into her chest without a second glance. His sword makes a terrible squelching noise as he pulls it out of her body, and she slumps over, dying or already dead.

Felix fixes Sylvain with a scathing look, and Sylvain scrambles off before either of them can get a word in, slipping downstairs into the relative safety of the lower deck and the hold below. He doesn’t look back, and he certainly doesn’t dwell on the look on Felix’s face right after Sylvain had attacked the enemy guard.

-

After the battle, after he’s saved Felix’s life - foolish, stupid, why did he do that? - Sylvain hunkers down in the hold. He’s sure someone must have seen him, or Felix must have told the captain by now. The ship will be turning around and heading back to Gautier any minute. He’s going to have to face his father, and he’ll either be forced back into a mockery of sonhood, or he’ll face the noose. Either way, he’s going to be made an example of.

Sylvain takes a ragged breath, pulling his red mask into his lip and clutching it tightly. He remembers when he got it, right after he’d run away from home. It’d been the first thing he bought after he crossed the border into Galatea, putting the meager amount of money he’d managed to swipe on the counter and begging for something, anything, to help hide himself.

The merchant woman had given him a long, considering look, and then had said that he’d never be able to be subtle with his hair being the way it was. Instead, she’d offered him the mask, and he’d never looked back.

He doubts he’ll get to keep it much longer. His father will see to its destruction, no doubt.

Heavy footsteps and the scrape of a door disrupt the relative peace of the hold. Immediately, Sylvain rests a hand on the hilt of his sword, waiting with narrowed eyes. If they’re going to come throw him in the hold, he’s at the very least not going to go down without a fight.

Instead, it’s just Felix, pulling aside the barrel he’s crouched behind and looking down with a faint sneer on his face. His amber eyes glint in the light, almost wolfish, and Sylvain tightens a hand on his sword reflexively.

“Relax,” Felix snaps. “Stop looking at me like a trapped dog.”

Sylvain feels trapped. He’s caught here, completely at Felix’s mercy. Still, he allows himself to loosen his grip on his sword hilt ever so slightly at Felix’s words. “Well?”

Felix pulls a roll of gauze and a small, cloth-wrapped bundle out of his pockets. He tosses the gauze to him, one of the tight lines around his mouth easing when Sylvain catches it deftly. He sets the cloth bundle carefully down on the floor in front of Sylvain. It seems Felix still dislikes the touch of others. Unsurprising, really, and only to be expected considering that he’s still wearing gloves. “I dislike owing people. You saved my life. The least I can do is return the favor.”

Sylvain rips a piece of the bread off and shoves it into his mouth. It’s the first time he’s eaten all day, and he’s grateful for Felix in a way he neither enjoys feeling nor knows how to express. He finishes it quickly, and looks up to see Felix still watching over him. There’s an uncomfortable, strained expression on his face, although it flits away as soon as Sylvain meets his eyes.

“Thanks,” Sylvain says, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

Felix’s lip curls. “Don’t get used to it.” 

He turns and leaves Sylvain alone in the dark once more, with only the groaning of the ship and the faint sound of the waves for company.


	3. iii. you craved me once

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Felix does something he regrets. Sylvain seeks an intimacy that isn't there.

It’s the twentieth day of the Pegasus Moon, Felix Fraldarius is eleven, and there’s a dead boy in a barrow. He’s been there for several days now, and he should have been transported away, should have been swept into an unmarked grave where he’d be burned to ash and cinder. But there’s fresh snow that covers him now, and cold mud that seeps through Felix’s boots, and the stench of rotting flesh is what greets him on his birthday instead.

He’s about to begin pushing Glenn down the edges of the cobbled alley when the sounds of hooves clopping through slush bring Fe’s attention elsewhere. There’s a holler, the crack of a whip, and then whinnying as a pair of horses rear to the opposite side and a silver-lined carriage comes to a halt. Inside is a boy, with crisp hair, and he’s looking down at Felix with an expression of abject horror.

It’s funny to Felix, even at the spry age of eleven, how vastly different another’s life could be from his own in these parts.

“Move it!” Shouts the coachman from above; he’s older, with a pointed moustache and a sleek-fitted coat that marks him as a servant to high merchants. And currently, he’s staring at Felix as if he’s a starving mutt that’s been kicked to the ground below.

There isn’t much he can do. The lone wheel of his barrow snags on a raised stone, and there’s a noise rising from his lips that’s choked off when he narrowly avoids tipping it. Instead Felix fixes the coachman a glare, letting amber eyes linger over the ornate carriage that’s barricaded him inwards. The boy is still staring. Felix meets him with a glob of spit being projected at the cold ground beneath.

The child turns away, seems to focus his attention back onto the man at his side.

Felix doesn’t see him again for another moon.

The marketplace is bustling when their meeting comes to full fruition. He’s amongst the shadows, all inky movements and languid tramping. And perhaps Felix would have gotten away with it, with that loaf in his hand and ruby apple in the other, if it were not for the boy.

“Hey!”

He’s standing in the middle of the marketplace, all lanky joints and Titian red hair. And either he must not realize what Felix is doing, too caught up in cupping freckled hands to lips and letting his voice carry, or he does and just doesn’t care. Either way, those hazel eyes that once stared through him with a sense of fresh terror are now looking at him with endearing surprise.

It’s also, inexplicably, what gets him caught.

Felix doesn’t actually recall when it first happened. Maybe it’s because Glenn’s death is still fresh in his mind – elastic skin, cold face – but he’s going slack-jawed at the sensation of a solid grip suddenly manhandling his shoulders.

“You! You little fuckin’ _thief_! Trying to steal my precious food!” Though the man’s yelling at him, spit droplets landing with little grace across the expanse of Felix’s face, he barely registers it. There’s no anger. No disgust. No emotion there at all, really.

It’s hard to process any response at all, when his brain has gone frightfully dark.

Those strong palms are moving down to shake freely at Felix’s bare hands, and instead of fighting back, or at least pushing the vendor, he goes limp. Lets the food drop and the apple become thoroughly bruised. In the end, Fraldarius feels a relative coolness flooding through him. Pins and needles leave invisible pinpricks of beading blood, and there’s a set of eyes that aren’t his – they can’t be – but are his, in the end, watching from afar. There’s no connection there. Whatever tethers him to his body has gone cold, and in its wake is a confused child whose mind can’t comprehend what is happening.

In some cruel universe, that feeling might have persisted. He might have been brought before the guards who would have his thumbs individually cut clean off. But instead there’s a boy, and something akin to the scent of cedar, and the gleam of a coin purse.

“Here, sir. I’ll buy these. How much? Five coins?” It’s too much for such simple commodities, and all three know it. The vendor released Felix.

“Take them. They’re ruined now. Tell this sack of scum that if he returns, I’ll throw him to the hounds out back.” The threat is made a promise when the man four times his senior spits upon Felix’s muddied boot. He’s still standing to the side, numb, even as the other boy offers up the apple and loaf of dirtied bread in his direction.

“I can’t take these.” They’re the first words Felix has uttered, now that they’re out of the general throng of the marketplace. Both of them are standing in a back alley, musty and smelling faintly of someone’s sewage.

“Why not? You wanted them. So, I paid for them.” This child looks confused. Too confused, and Felix briefly wonders if he’s alright. “He was going to take you to the guards, you know. They don’t treat people who steal kindly.”

There’s something that Glenn used to tell him. “Don’t take what you can’t compensate for.” But the words are shrouded by confusion, because suddenly the boy is laughing, and Felix is left looking perplexed.

“Alright. If you want to give _compensation_ , come back and see me again.” Hazel eyes are looking at him roundly, causing Felix to swallow once, apprehensively.

“Okay.”

The answering grin that comes to the other child’s face is enough to wipe most of the underlying hesitancy Felix feels in that moment.

The problem with Sylvain Jose Gautier is that he does not leave Felix Hugo Fraldarius alone. Does not leave him alone, even when it’s been five years since he’s departed, five years since they’ve cursed each other out, and a millennium more between them since they’d been even relatively okay.

It’s the morning after the skirmish, and Felix is only just leaving his quarters, bloodied gauze wrapped tightly around his left forearm. He’d been cut by an Imperial vagabond, though the adrenaline of a cold sword and a heated bullet lodging themselves into warm bodies had fogged much of his mind.

Felix finds Sylvain where he was left last night. Stowed away and tucked neatly between barrels, hand resting haltingly against the hilt of his scabbard. He looks pathetic, like an abandoned babe, and Felix can’t even find it in himself to feel pity. There’s nothing there, really. Just regret and an emotion he can’t place.

“You look pathetic.” It’s the first thing he thinks to say. Sylvain’s only answering response is a languid grin that both of them know is built on false pretenses.

Wordlessly, and with thinly veiled disgust, Felix pulls out a loaf and tears it in half without much grace. And then he’s tossing it in Sylvain’s direction, watches as he extends hands to catch it in large palms.

“Thanks.” But hazel eyes are catching on Felix’s outstretched arm; despite the food in his grasp, Sylvain’s fingers twitch. “You’re hurt.”

He’d almost forgotten about the gauze, in all honesty. It’s old, still needs to be changed, and in response Felix hikes his sleeve even further down. “Don’t worry about it. Shut up and eat the bread I gave you, before the rats scout out your crumbs.”

If only it were that simple. But Sylvain is stubborn, has always been, and that hand is flexing in the open air again.

Felix doesn’t like it.

Stepping back, the gunner gives a once-over that packs more venom in it than even his rivalling tongue could. Sylvain must not expect it regardless, and despite the quick reflexes that Felix remembers an auburn boy once having, they’ve slowed. The gunner catches the brief flash of affliction over Sylvain’s face. It’s gone within a matter of seconds. A heartbeat, at most.

“Okay.” The other man’s tone has lost whatever once-familiar worry had plagued it. It’s monotone now, sounds robotic and carefully exercised. “Thank you. For the food.”

Fraldarius turns away. “Don’t.”

It seems that the Goddess herself hates him. Which, when it boils down to the very fundamentals of it, does not seem so preposterous. Not when Felix has already been dealt the bent cards in a terrible game of fate, not when a man he may as well have thought dead has risen from his grave.

But in the end, Sylvain always finds his way back to Felix. It’s not a good thing. Maybe once, a lifetime ago, he would have thought it was. But when he’s running from his ghosts and replaces them each with the metallic taste of a cold blade and blood upon his tongue, there’s nothing worth salvaging.

It’s precisely why Felix finds himself outside Leonie’s quarters, once the day’s activities have come to a slow halt. He hasn’t knocked on the door yet, instead flexes a leathered hand in the air and lets it fall limply against a bony hip.

He shouldn’t be doing this. And yet.

There’s a price on Sylvain’s head for his safe return to the Gautier Manor, and he needs the money. They all do. Splitting the bounty would equal enough food for each of them to last throughout the fast-approaching winter. Felix has to tell himself that Sylvain is little more than an acquaintance now; his betrayal should not mean much.

It’s why, in the end, he lets his knuckles rap once against a wooden door. It’s why he lets himself enter on heavy feet, and despite the way his legs feel like stilts and his arms like brick, draws a dagger forth and perforates the wooden desk with it.

“There’s a rat aboard our ship.” His voice is all gravel, no venom. It sends a chill down his own spine. “Found it sneaking around by the outer barrels.”

“A rat?” Leonie’s leaning forward on a pointed elbow, draws short nails against her lips. “Then kill it, Fraldarius. We don’t need vermin infesting _the Venatio_ any more than they already do.”

Sylvain is just a stranger.

“This one talks.”

That has the captain freezing up, joints locking together. “Does it, now?” Felix doesn’t like that look in her eye. Loathes it.

“Word has it there’s a pretty coin being tossed to whomever brings him in.” He can’t look at Leonie; freckled cheeks and a coarse set of ginger locks were already burned into his mind for a life’s worth of time, and then some. “A stowaway. Trying to make a quick escape. Told him if he moved, I’d cut him.” There’s a pause, a decisive measuring of words, and then Felix carries on. “He doesn’t know yet that I’ve come to you. Bastard thinks I’m in it to help him.”

Sylvain is a ghost. He is not a friend.

“I assume he hitched a ride while we were docked in Port Gautier.” There’s the narrowing of eyes: Felix can’t tell if Leonie has caught on that there is more that he isn’t telling. He tries his best to ignore it.

“Belongs to the merchant Gautier. Missing son.” That’s the detonator.

There’s the violent screech of chair pegs against ship flooring, like nails on a chalkboard. “Fucking hell, Fraldarius.” Leonie looks downright barmy. “Keep him from figuring out. I’m turning this ship around. She’s going back to port.”

He tries hard to not pay attention to the taste of bile rising in his throat. “And how do you propose I do that.”

Leonie laughs, but it’s not with the usual merry tone it so often portrays. “Keep doing what you’re doing, Felix.” There’s a crooked tilting of lips. “What a deceitful snake you are. Not even I would trust you with my life.”

There’s a sourness in his stomach, akin to curdled milk. The only response Felix offers is a wry smile as he turns away, leaving Pinelli alone once again.

That night he returns to Sylvain. The man’s in a restless sleep, broad joints forced together into unnatural angles. He looks, inexplicably, like a newborn babe. Felix pities him.

“Wake up.”

Immediately Sylvain is stirring, and perhaps the first time since arriving onboard Leonie’s ship, Sylvain’s hand does not immediately go towards the hilt of his scabbard. It’s miniscule, but it’s progress.

“Felix.” Round eyes are looking up at him with a layer of hesitancy. So, that kicked dog mien hasn’t totally dissipated. It should be considered a good thing.

“You’re getting scraps tonight. Crew were filthy pigs for what Ashe cooked up.” Brandishing a bundle of meagre morsels that have been wrapped amongst a handkerchief, there’s a few pieces of cheddar, half a biscuit. It’s not much, but it’s food nonetheless.

“No,” Sylvain says, only reaching for the food once Felix’s hands have left the bundle. “Scraps are good. This is more than I could ask for.” He looks so relieved that Felix, inexplicably, almost snaps at him to stop being an idiot. For what, he does not know. Perhaps it is the fact there is a guilt gnawing away at his lower gut.

Instead, Felix makes a strangled noise that sounds eerily like a growl. “Shut up and eat. Stop thanking me.” But instead of leaving, Felix finds himself hovering over Sylvain.

If the man notices, he does not say anything, instead digs into the food with a wolfish appetite. Somehow, despite picking the food apart with grubby hands and dirt-smeared fingers, he retains the proper eating etiquette of one born high up. It makes something hot and wrathful shoot through Felix.

Perhaps Felix would come to regret the next question that left his lips at a later time. But for now, with only the stars overhead to keep them company, he does not mind when prying words leave parted lips. “What did you do, Sylvain?”

Gautier has already long since finished eating, and if it weren’t for Felix’s inquiring, his eyes would have stayed shut. Felix almost wonders if the man thought he’d left. “What did I do?”

“When I left. There must be a reason you have a bounty over your head.”

The smile he receives is not genuine, and is not happy. It looks sad, in a way. Almost like Gautier’s been defeated. “Ran away. Stole some inheritance.” The laugh that follows does not meet Sylvain’s eyes. “Painted a bad name for them, huh? A dead son and an heir that’s defiled their title. What a shame.”

In another life, he might have told Sylvain that he would have helped. But he doesn’t, because how can he, when he was in different lands neither of them had seen before? There had been an impregnable ocean between them. Instead, he says this: “What a pity.”

Sylvain turns away, looks out over the railing at the bottomless sea. “Yeah.”

It’s an end to a conversation that had barely begun. Felix takes it as his cue to leave both the vigilante and his stars above.

The next morning, when Felix awakes, he does not need to be told to know they have changed course. It will be a few days yet until they reach Port Gautier once again, and when he rouses from his quarters, is met with the knowing stare of Captain Pinelli. Something begins to rot inside of him when he sees it.

During the days he tends to his usual affairs; Felix busies himself with the polishing of guns and swords, keeps in order the lower crewmembers, and makes sure that no matter what, Gautier is not found. Felix tells himself it’s because he wants to be the one to turn Sylvain in, but even a daft drunk would have been able to see it was not the case.

During the nights, he finds himself spending more time with Sylvain. And he knows it’s a problem, especially when he begins to pick up on the old habits he’d formed only when around the auburn-haired man.

Felix is sitting on a barrel, Sylvain on the ground, when he cracks his first smile. It’s been eight nights since Sylvain was first found by Felix, and four since they’ve turned around.

Sylvain does still not know, and Felix will not tell him. Not when tomorrow morning they will be back in Gautier territory.

Instead, the vigilante is talking as if there is no other trouble plaguing the world except for his sore ass and the way his thighs have begun to cramp once again. “I can’t believe this. How come you won’t let me do sprints around the lower deck? I’m losing my impeccable form.”

Felix is already shaking his head, bangs falling loose from a clipped ponytail drawn tightly. “Because you will be a dead man. A foolish dead man. And I will not come to your rescue when the crew guts you.” The words are harsh, and yet, somehow, there is humour laced within them.

“Ah, but I’m already a dead man. At least by my father’s standards.” Tapping the mask laying limp across his chest, Sylvain places it to his face. “The Red Cardinal takes my place instead.”

It is not the self-loathing humour that attracts a crooked tilting of thin lips. Instead it is the grin that crosses paths with Sylvain, and the way clumsy fingers drop the mask back onto the shipboards accidentally. It is also, inexplicably, what kills the conversation. Felix would realize later on that it was not the words that followed from Sylvain that left them both staring, that it was not the way a man once close leaned too far in. That it was the way moonlight caught on a canine and flashed it in the night air, silent, and yet somehow mesmerizing.

“I haven’t seen that smile since before you left.” The words ring loud in the midnight breeze, despite the hushedness of them.

Felix, for all his quick thinking and sharp words, is left at an impasse. And perhaps it’s the silence that confuses Gautier, or the stricken surprise on Fraldarius’s face that does it. But either way, there’s a hand steadying a broad torso, and then a tongue darts out, flicks nervously over a bottom lip.

Suddenly there’s a violent thud as the gunner scrambles away. Because Sylvain’s leaning closer, and it’s only a heartbeat before it’s too late that Felix realizes what the man is about to do. “What are you _doing?_ ” He snarls, lip curling vehemently.

Sylvain’s watching with wide eyes as Felix stands, like a spooked buck. “I thought – I misread the situation. I’m sorry. I’m sorry, I wouldn’t have done anything if –”

Felix cuts him off with a wicked stare and a hand that flies instinctively to where his dagger is hidden. “You thought wrong. Play out your little boyhood fantasies with some other bloke. Not me.”

Like so many other instances in his life, Felix turns and walks away from the source of his troubles. Hazel eyes that swim within a lake of hurt and surprise are what haunt his dreams that night.

He’s awoken to a commotion outside, the following day. There’s a docking bell and the sounds of sharp yells, the drawing of a sword and the jangling of chains. He’s the last in the quarters, and already there’s a sickening nausea that threatens to spill last night’s meal. _The_ _Venatio_ has found home once again on the shore of Gautier territory, and that yelling plaguing Felix’s ears belongs to none other than Sylvain himself.

Despite it all, Felix forces himself to gather steady legs and slow the racing beat of a troubled heart. And when he exits the sleeping quarters, squints and shields eyes from a high afternoon sun, he finally sees what truly the commotion is.

Balthus and Raphael have a struggling Sylvain cuffed, and in front are two port guards who are dealing with handed papers. At the back is Pinelli, pistol cocked and the head of it jammed roughly between Gautier’s shoulder blades. Sylvain must have realized earlier that morning that they had docked, and alerted his whereabouts to the other crew members when he’d tried to jump railing. Of course Fraldarius had not been awoken then.

In the end, it is Sylvain that sees him first. “Felix!” His voice rings terse in the warm air, and if Felix strains enough, he can hear the desperation laced in with that single word.

Except he doesn’t move. Doesn’t move even when the rest of the crew looks in his direction, doesn’t move when Leonie waves with a laugh. “Fraldarius! You’ve finally woken. Care to walk with us? You’re the one who did the honours of telling us about him in the first place.”

Any hope Sylvain must have carried is shattered, and along with it falls a numb expression that clouds the other man’s face. Felix does not meet his eyes.

After several moments, Fraldarius steps forward, cocking his head. “Get a move on with him. Gautier’s going to want to see his son, after all.”


	4. iv. think not with my heart but with my head

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The consequences of Sylvain's actions finally catch up to him. Instead of facing them head on, he falls back into his memories, and tries to spot the warning signs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> chapter four!!! this one was super fun to write, i hope you enjoy! there's a conversation w/ sylvain's father and a few references to past abuse, so mind the tags, etc

The last time Sylvain saw Felix, it was easier to remember what was left unsaid. When he thinks of what happened between the two of them, he barely dwells on their parting words. Their argument feels inconsequential. The important things are this:

Felix’s lips against his. Felix’s wide-eyed expression. Sylvain’s dawning realization that he’d touched Felix’s bare skin. Felix telling him that he was leaving on a ship that afternoon. He hadn’t been looking at Sylvain when he said it, as though that would somehow soften the blow.

He ruins everything he touches. It’s the curse of the Gautier men: they want what they can’t have. His father wanted power, wealth, and a son to hold up like a trophy. Miklan wanted blood, both Sylvain’s and House Gautier’s. A firstborn bastard - anything can happen in Port Gautier, they say.

Then there’s Sylvain, with this twisted desire inside of him that pollutes the world around him. It’s been rotting him from the moment he was born, and if he doesn't stop it, it’ll rot Felix as well.

-

Leonie Pinelli is a harsh woman, with a voice that reminds Sylvain of heat waves that sap the life from your bones. She comes and finds him in his hiding spot in the morning, Balthus and Raphael at her side. They’re bigger and stronger than him, but he’s quick, and he almost manages to get over the railing of the ship and into the water. Almost isn’t enough though, and Balthus snatches him out of the air, a large hand wrapping around the collar of his jacket and dragging him back onto the deck.

He feels like a stray cat, if most stray cats have a gun pointed at their back.

“Easy fellas,” Sylvain says. “I’m sure we can work this out.”

Balthus grabs his wrists and forces them roughly behind his back. “Sorry pal. It’s nothing personal.”

“Bullshit,” Sylvain says. Raphael snaps the handcuffs around his wrists, and Sylvain tries to pull away, the harsh metal cutting into his wrists. For all his posturing and clever words, he’s no better than a trapped dog, willing to gnaw its own leg off to get away.

“It’s really not.” The captain’s voice cuts through everything else, and Sylvain stops struggling for just a moment. There’s a click as she cocks the gun, and Sylvain swallows. He has no reason to think she wouldn’t shoot. “We just need the money.”

“It’s personal for me,” Sylvain snaps.

Leonie presses the barrel of the pistol a little harder between his shoulderblades. He thinks that she’s about to say something else, but Felix appears on the deck, and all their previous conversation is lost. His hair is loose, for once, draped over his shoulders like an inkspill. He looks beautiful, and that sours Sylvain’s mood even more so.

Pathetic. “Felix!” It’s pathetic, to think Felix would do anything at all about this situation, would even bother caring.

Felix doesn’t move a muscle. Leonie laughs, and Sylvain flinches like he’s been burned. “Fraldarius! You’ve finally woken. Care to walk with us? You’re the one who did the honours of telling us about him in the first place.”

Sylvain feels his face fall as whatever last vestige of hope he has is squashed. Felix won’t look at him. It’s almost worse, how he seems completely unwilling to even acknowledge his betrayal.

Felix takes a step forward, the planks of the ship creaking underneath his boots. “Get a move on with him. Gautier’s going to want to see his son, after all.”

There’s no fight left in Sylvain when he’s dragged off the ship. He doesn’t say a word as he’s paraded through the streets of a place he used to call home, merchants and locals crowding the streets and watching. The Red Cardinal is caught. The news will be everywhere by nightfall, and any hope he might have had of keeping his identity a secret will be gone along with it.

-

Regardless of how much he hates thinking about it, Sylvain thinks about that kiss with Felix more often than he’d like. It had been early in the morning, the sun still creeping lazily over the horizon. The faint outline of the moon could be seen in the sky above them, and Felix had looked beautiful.

It’s odd, the things you keep in a memory. The things that stay with a person.

Felix looks beautiful in all Sylvain's memories, but there are none so striking as the instant before Sylvain kissed him. He closes his eyes and lets himself plunge into the memory, trying desperately to be anywhere but where he is.

-

“You’re beautiful,” Sylvain whispers.

Felix scoffs. “You’re full of shit.” It’s fond, familiar.

Sylvain rolls his eyes. “You like it.”

Felix doesn’t reply.

One of Sylvain’s hands reaches out to grip at Felix’s upper arm. He can barely feel the muscle that he knows is there through Felix’s heavy wool coat, but Felix tenses underneath his touch nonetheless. Sylvain leans forward, the waves lapping gently at the shore. The emotion in Felix’s amber eyes is hard to parse, but Sylvain will spend the rest of his life figuring it out if he has to. Felix moves away, almost imperceptibly, but he doesn’t shove Sylvain off of him.

Sylvain tilts his head to the side, flicking his eyes up to meet Felix’s. Almost imperceptibly, he nods. A slow, careful smile spreads across Sylvain’s face. Felix doesn’t return it, but he brings a hand up to touch Sylvain’s shoulder, fleeting and only there for a moment. “I’ve got you,” Sylvain whispers, and then he bends down and closes the gap between them.

Felix is hesitant, and slow to move, but eventually he parts his lips and lets Sylvain’s tongue curl into his mouth. It’s barely a kiss by Sylvain’s standards, but he doesn’t want to overwhelm Felix.

He pulls back. Felix’s eyes are open, and there’s still an emotion in them that he doesn’t know, but he feels a little closer to understanding. “Was that okay?”

Felix’s eyes blink shut for half a second too long. Later, Sylvain will look back on that half a second and wish he’d taken advantage of it. “I’m leaving.”

“What?”

Felix steps back. Sylvain’s arm falls to his side. “I’m leaving.” Felix turns, looking out to the sea. “I’ve booked passage on a ship. It leaves in the morning.”

Sylvain opens his mouth and then snaps it shut. “I - what? How long are you going to be gone?”

Felix laughs, bitter and choking. “I’m not coming back, Sylvain. We both know there isn’t anything left here.”

I’m here. Sylvain doesn’t say it, but he thinks it, and that’s almost the same. “Right,” he says. “Of course.” There’s a million things he wants to say, but they’ll just drag Felix down to his level. He doesn’t deserve that. Like he said - there isn’t anything here.

Felix tells him that he doesn’t have to wake up to see him off, but Sylvain does nonetheless. Their goodbye is awkward and stilted, taken up mostly by what they’re not saying. Felix climbs aboard _The Venatio_ and doesn’t look back.

Sylvain watches the ship sail away, into the light of the rising sun. He’s going to remember the way Felix looked today for the rest of his life. He stands on the docks with his hands in his pockets, watching the horizon.

He stays until long after the ship is gone and there’s nothing left. If he closes his eyes, he can almost imagine Felix is still here, standing beside him. There’d been nights where all they had done was sit on the docks, not even talking. Sylvain had never known that it could be comfortable to exist beside a person before. He’s going to miss that.

Sylvain turns away from the moonlit ocean and trudges back towards the Gautier estate. He isn’t going to let this place be the death of him. Sooner or later, he’s going to get out.

-

“Sylvain,” his father’s voice hasn’t changed at all in the last few years. It’s still loud and booming, the force of it taking up an entire room. His father speaks, and Sylvain feels like a cornered animal. He wants to step back, to press his back against a wall to at least try to isolate the danger to one side. Pathetic.

“Father,” he says stiffly.

Lord Gautier sighs. “I don’t know where to begin with you. Disappointment is not a severe enough word for the shame you have brought upon this household.”

Sylvain averts his eyes, staring instead at the polished floors. As always, everything in the Gautier estate is meticulous. The perfect family.

His father sighs again. Sylvain wishes he would just yell at him. It’s coming later, he knows, but the disappointment is worse. It’s for show, just to maintain some level of respectability, and yet it still sends a wave of shame curling through him.

“First the business with your brother, and now this?” Lord Gautier paces the room, his polished shoes heavy on the stone floor. “Your mother and I aren’t speaking anymore, you know. You broke her heart when you left.”

Liar. No one in this house, Sylvain included, has ever loved anything.

“And as for the politics…” Sylvain’s father trails off. “The other lords see me as weak. If I can’t even keep my house in order, how am I supposed to run a port? A dead bastard is almost forgivable, but a vagabond? A _vigilante?_ ” He sighs again. Sylvain wouldn’t give up his years as the Red Cardinal for anything, but the knowledge leaves him feeling guilty. Surely his father gives up plenty for him; why can’t he just be grateful for once in his life?

“Well?” Sylvain’s father stops walking in front of his son, still hand-cuffed and looking at the floor. “Do you have anything to say for yourself?”

Sylvain shakes his head.

His father sighs, louder this time. “I don’t want to do this, Sylvain. I wish things could be simple. You know that.”

Lord Gautier walks over to the entryway table, where Leonie and her men deposited the scant few supplies he had. He picks up his mask and walks back over, stopping in front of Sylvain.

The Red Cardinal mask looks small in his father’s hands, as fragile as Sylvain himself feels. It’s beautiful, with a sturdy base of paper-mache and a sheen of red paint on its surface. The feathers on it are real, and despite all that Sylvain has been through with it, he’s never seen a single one come off. To him, the mask had always seemed unbreakable, some sort of representation of everything he was trying to be.

Now, he realized that it’s been fragile all along, and he’s just never been able to see it before.

His father drops it to the ground and lifts his foot, stepping on it and breaking it cleanly in half. Sylvain flinches back as though he’s been hit, his arms rising up to shield his face from a blow that isn’t coming.

There’s a sneer on his father’s face when he looks up, lowering his arms and ignoring the spike of embarrassment. “Pathetic,” his father booms. “Weak-willed. Who would want you for a son?”

Sylvain’s gaze drops back to his feet, still unwilling - or perhaps unable - to look his father in the eye. He can’t. “Guards!” His father calls, turning away. “Escort my son to his room. He can’t be trusted to roam the estate.”

He doesn’t fight when his father’s guards come and grab hold of his arms. They lead him off to his room, and the only thing heavier than Sylvain’s feet are his heart. The door to his childhood bedroom slams shut behind him as he’s roughly shoved inside, a click sounding and proving that he’s well and truly locked inside. 

Sylvain sinks to the ground, his back against the door. Felix is gone, and everything is terrible. He pulls his knees to his chest, closes his eyes, and tries to pretend he’s somewhere else.

-

The worst version of their kiss goes something like this:

Sylvain kisses Felix. Felix pushes him away and laughs. Sylvain apologizes. It’s not enough - it’s never enough. The water lapping at the shore turns red, a faint stain of blood on the sands.

In front of him, Felix’s eyes go dark, and his gaze turns cold.

“Felix?” Sylvain’s voice cracks when he speaks, and he’s suddenly aware of the exhaustion weighing him down.

“I don’t love you,” Felix says. “You never meant anything to me.”

“Felix, please. It was one kiss.” Sylvain’s mouth tastes like ruin and decay. He’s drowning even as he speaks, the sound of the ocean roaring in his ears.

“You should know better,” Felix says. “No one is ever going to love you.”

Sylvain wakes with a jolt. He’s still on the floor of his childhood bedroom, and there’s a terrible pain in his neck. His heartbeat is so loud he swears he can feel it straining against his ribs. There’s a pounding in his ears, and a sharp, copper taste in his mouth. He brings his fingers up to his lip and they come away stained red. Sylvain squeezes his eyes shut, Felix’s words still ringing in his ears.

It was a dream. Felix hadn’t had anything to say to him when they kissed all those years ago, or earlier today when they’d marched him off the ship like the piece of shit he is.

Even if it wasn’t real, the words Felix had uttered still ring true. He’s unloveable. Unwanted. That’s been made clear enough in the past twenty-four hours.

He stands, muscles sore and cramped from being on the floor for so long. It’s late afternoon, if the sunlight filtering into his bedroom is to be trusted. He arches his back, a faint pop sounding before he trudges over to his bed and sits down on the edge.

It’s perfectly made. The whole room has been stripped of what little personality it had. Cold, clinical walls no longer have any of the art pieces he’d carefully selected, and the plush rug he’d spent his allowance on years ago is gone as well. He supposes he shouldn’t be surprised; he hasn’t been here in years. Besides, he’s a prisoner, and prisoners don’t get accommodations to their liking. His father has taught him that lesson many times.

He lays down, staring up at the dull white ceiling. Despite himself, his thoughts turn to Felix.

Sylvain should hate him. He wants to. Try as he might, though, he can’t quite muster up the contempt that he knows anyone else would be feeling in spades. His father’s always said he was weak, that he’d bend to anyone that showed him a scrap of kindness. This whole ordeal seems to be proving him right in that aspect.

It’s just - there'd been that look on Felix’s face. Sylvain’s sure he wasn’t supposed to see the terrible look of longing and guilt, not to mention the hurt that lay buried somewhere underneath everything else.

Felix sold him out. He shouldn’t be thinking about him, shouldn’t be trying to decide if Felix really meant it, or if it was somehow an accident. He’s not that naive, he knows that Felix’s ship needed the money, that Privateering is becoming less and less profitable these days. Still, there was that look.

Sylvain has kissed so many people. One kiss from five years ago shouldn’t mean anything at all anymore. Neither should an almost-kiss.

He falls back into bed, laying flat on his back and laying despondently up at the ceiling. Idiot. Stupid. Naive. What did he expect - that Felix was going to keep sneaking him food forever? That they’d reconcile, and everything would be like it had when they were stupid kids? Things weren’t perfect even then. Miklan had still been alive, and Felix had still had a dead brother and terrible prospects.

It’s time he grew up and accepted that there simply isn’t such a thing as happy endings.

Sylvain throws a hand over his eyes, closing them and trying not to dwell on what other punishments await him. He should have known better.

It must be late, and he’s surprised he hasn’t heard from anyone. The whole estate has been almost dead silent, now that he’s come to think about it. It’s odd, but not completely out of the question. There’s footsteps coming up the stairs, heavy ones from the sound of it. Sylvain rises, his mind already racing to the worst possible option. His father must have changed his mind, decided that these accommodations were too good for him.

There’s a thump against the door, and a muttered curse from the other side. Sylvain frowns; that doesn’t sound like a guard. Another thump, and then the door slowly creaks open. Sylvain sees his eyes before anything else, amber and narrowed in suspicion. Felix’s hair is in a high ponytail, and he’s flanked by members of his crew. “Well? Are you just going to stand there?”


	5. v. soldier, poet, king

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> King Dimitri calls for a rally in Fhirdiad, the crew ransacks the Gautier manor, and Felix learns about troubles of the heart.

There are a lot of things a Fraldarius is good at. Disappointing others is a specialty.

“There you go, toying with that knife again.” Felix is staring over the crowded room to Lysithea, perched upon a barrel and tallying their bounty when Yuri finds him. It’s not much of a surprise to Felix; nothing escapes violet eyes. Not even when a gunner with the silent grace of a puma chooses to slip away from prying stares.

“You’d do best not to question it.” It’s an empty threat. Both of them know it. Leonie would have him gutted if he even so much as configured the idea of slitting the first mate’s throat.

Yuri purses his lips, leaning against the wall opposite of Felix. “You’re so lost that you haven’t noticed the nick on your finger. Have you grown dull?”

The fact of the matter is, Felix is bleeding. The tip of his dagger has poked through leather and he pulls it away to catch the beading of fresh blood on his skin. When he raises it to his lips, it tastes of bitter material, grime and a metallic tang. It’s warm and inviting as it spreads through his mouth.

When Felix pulls away, there’s an intangible expression across his face. Instead, he turns away. “Perhaps.”

He thinks that the blood on his lips is Sylvain’s.

When Felix is thirteen, there are two things that his adolescent mind comes to realize. The first is that he’s the same age as Glenn when he died. The second is that despite what the Gautier household may put on display for all to see, it’s a façade. Instead, a lineage of merchants and upper-class wealth is built on the backs of stone-cold lies and shadows that lurk in the folded corners of a manor. It’s so precariously placed that Felix knows that with a slight push, it could come crumbling down. An empire of greed destroyed in a single instance.

He learns this the night he comes across Sylvain, fifteen, with a broken wrist and a split eyebrow. There’s dried blood crusting his cheek, blotting out freckles that once highlighted rosy skin. Now, there’s a set of hollowed eyes and a frame that refuses to become anything but hunched over.

At first, it hadn’t been apparent Sylvain was standing in the alleyway outside the Fraldarius household. A sleeping Felix had been awoken to the sounds of pebbles ricocheting off glass windows, and by the light of an oil lamp, he’d seen a familiar face.

“What are you doing here?” He’d asked, and the shadows that came out to play and dance along Sylvain’s form made the boy look twice as small as he usually did. They unnerved Felix.

“I need help.” The voice that’d responded seemed almost broken, ashamed and timid. Cradled to his chest was a hand bent in an odd shape, swollen and crooked. It was a ghastly sight, to say the least.

There’s a brief moment of hesitance before Felix gives in. “One second.” He closes the window tightly shut, bolts it and slips on muddied boots underneath a nightgown. There’s not much in terms of amenities in the house, but he knows where Rodrigue keeps the aid supplies, and that’s good enough. There’s a cupboard located by the hearth, and Felix has to open it slowly to avoid any attention by means of squeaks and whines from rotting wood and rusted bolts.

When he finally emerges from the house, it’s with a bottle of unnamed alcohol, a jar of honey, and a cloth to hug tightly around a thin neck.

“What happened to you?” Felix doesn’t bother saying hi. They don’t need to, anymore. Silence was better than meaningless words.

Except, Sylvain doesn’t answer his question either. Instead skirts around it, picking up a wad of honey in his open palm as he does so to smooth along the shallow cut of his brow. “It doesn’t matter. I was walking. Accidentally crushed my hand in a door.”

The excuse doesn’t make sense. But there’s something in Sylvain’s lingering gaze that makes Felix stop prying, and he says this: “Why did you come to me? Why did you not ask your family for help? It was a simple accident.”

A silence fills the air, and it isn’t a comfortable one. It lays thick with words unsaid, and Sylvain stills with the propping of his wrist and a cloth wrapped around his neck. “They were asleep.” The vulnerability that’s laced in doesn’t go unnoticed by Felix. “I can promise you that they would not help.”

It’s a long time before either of them speaks, after that. But when Felix does, it’s quiet, and it’s said with such a layer of conviction that it surprises even him. Despite what a thirteen-year-old might think, there’s little they truly grasp; even now, sitting with a shivering Sylvain, Felix comprehends neither his words nor the situation at hand. “You can come here. When you hurt yourself again.” Thin lips purse themselves, and Felix has to look away from the earnest gaze his friend now fixes him with.

“Do you mean that?”

“Yeah. Swear it.”

The answering smile is crooked, but it doesn’t look happy. It looks almost like Sylvain is cracking, like a broken plate that’s been dropped to the cold ground beneath. “Thank you, Felix.”

Bile rises in his throat. “You don’t need to thank me.”

Denial and deception have always played hand in hand. It’s not necessarily something Felix has ever paid attention to. There’s no need when it comes to privateering; he’s found that his career begins with deceit and ends with deceit.

It’s different when it comes to the Merchant Gautier though. And despite what Felix might like to believe, there’s a toxin inside of him that’s only seeping out through the bloodletting of his own skin. It threatens to take him alive, to drown him in his own faults and woes and the impossible guilt of knowing what he’s done.

Inexplicably, it’s also why he’s now found himself in front of Leonie's quarters. He doesn’t need to knock. She opens the door before he can even lay a leather knuckle upon it.

“What is it, Fraldarius?” Behind her, there’s a coin purse drawn up by the string. It looks heavy. Felix wants to vomit.

“I need to talk to you. About that vigilante we turned in.” Already Leonie’s backing up, and already Felix is pushing through to stand on the opposite side of the tight quarters.

Leonie looks to the coin purse. “What is there to talk about? We’ve returned him to Gautier. Got our bounty. Tomorrow we’re hoisting sails.” There’s the pursing of lips. “King Dimitri’s called for a rally in Fhirdiad.”

Somehow, the information presents itself as worse than intended. Felix shouldn’t care that they’re leaving port. He shouldn’t, and yet, calculated words are leaving loose lips before he can stop them. “We should go back for him.” There’s a swallow. “That bounty wasn’t enough.”

“Is that all?”

“No.”

“There’s a lot you don’t tell, Fraldarius.”

It’s the truth. There’s no amount of wealth in the world that could unlock the sea of secrets that froth underneath sinew muscle. Instead, tight lips draw together and form an impenetrable line. “He would prove a useful asset. I’ve seen how he fights.” Felix doesn’t need a reminder. There are images then, of a flickering flame moving solidly across a boat deck. A scabbard, and the squelching of blood. “He knows his way around navigation.”

Leonie leans forward, props a hand underneath a sharp chin. “And what would we do with Gautier. He’ll be on our asses before we can get out of the port.”

When Felix next leans forward, his voice is little more than a hushed murmur. It sounds like a secret meant entirely for the two of them. “There’s a way around the wealthy, Captain.” Thin lips purse themselves, amber eyes locked with a tide of orange. “Start with a false sense of security. He has everything he wants now, does he not?”

That’s how the plan goes, evidently. By nightfall, Felix has a dagger to a guard’s neck, the warmth of blood from a carotid artery splattering high cheekbones, and gloved hands that are tainted by death once more.

In the end, it’s easy to get into the merchant’s quarters. Especially when Leonie’s got a scabbard at the ready to his left, and Balthus cocking a pistol to his right. When a set of doors swings open and Felix finds the man lounged upon his chesterfield, a goblet of wine settled in a broad palm and a hearth at full flame, he knows they’ve come unexpectedly.

“Hi, Gautier.” Felix’s voice rings deadpan in the air. The man scrambles, or at least tries to, but the blunt head of a pistol being trained upon a moving target has him stopping in his tracks.

“You.” He’s not directing it at the gunner specifically. There’s no way of knowing Felix from what seems like a past life. Not when he’s cut stringed hair with knives and wears scars that were not present several years prior. “What are you doing back here?” The panic in his voice reaches a crescendo, lacing it like a dog whose whine bleeds into the air. “Where are my guards? Guards!”

There’s a knowing smile that crosses Felix’s lips. It’s not a comforting one, not by any means, and the wolfish look brings to light a malicious glint to amber eyes. “Sorry, sir. They’re not around.” As if on cue Felix lifts a gloved hand, touches the side of his cheek in an attempt to clear blood. It only smudges it further though, and he hums as leather pulls away shining. “We thought your bounty wasn’t quite so appealing after all. Care to give us more?”

When the Merchant Gautier nods, it’s slow and precise. Calculating, like a lion crouched in reeds. Felix doesn’t plan on being made prey. “Okay. How much? An extra five hundred? One thousand?”

Throughout Felix’s life, he’s known the eyes to be the windows into the soul. Glenn hadn’t taught him that, and instead, it’d been a lesson he’d learnt himself. He’d spent nearly a decade staring through Sylvain’s. His father’s eyes were the same colour, but they were harder around the edges. There was no warmth. Felix was sure anything bright and kind had been sucked out a century beforehand. “I’m afraid that’s not what we want, exactly.”

When the gun behind Felix clicks into place, Gautier hears it. “What is it then? My manor is yours to ransack. Whatever valuables you desire shall be made yours.”

Felix motions with the crooking of an index finger. Balthus steps forward, immense and daunting. “Where’s the key, Gautier.” It’s not a question. Nothing was ever a question when it came to the gunner.

“What?”

“The key.”

There’s a look of desperation that crosses the man’s face. It isn’t pretty. Instead, it distorts features and makes Felix feel a wrath of fury pool low in his gut and traverse upwards to the left-centre of his chest. His heart seems to be the target. “Will you leave? If I hand you the key?”

There’s the pulling of lips, a whistle in the air as Felix circles around to the other side. Now that all three are surrounding Gautier from either side, he’s forced to turn his back to at least one. “Perhaps. Hand it over. Then we’ll talk.”

Immediately Gautier snaps into action. He’s slow with his movements, focusing on the hilt of Leonie’s sword and Balthus’s handgun. But he rummages around the cabinets regardless, and Felix hears the telltale jingling of metal keys. “Here. Take them. What use will he be to privateers? I am sure you’ll find as much to do with him as myself.” When he says the last words, it’s with a sneer.

Felix fights the urge to smack him with the blunt hilt of his cutlass.

“Set anyone on our trail and we’ll kill you.” It’s Leonie who’s speaking, thumbing at a half-sheathed sword. “Mark my words, Gautier. My crew is more lethal than you realize.”

There are few things Felix finds solace in. Perhaps one of the only is Sylvain. When he was younger, he might have accepted it as little more than a need for attention. He’d always found comfort with tilted smiles and freckled skies.

He knows now that it runs deeper than that. It always has.

“Well? Are you just going to stand there?” When he finds Sylvain, it’s in a separate section from the merchant’s quarters entirely. The room is clinical, made more for sterilization of infectious diseases than it is for the hosting of a human being.

Sylvain, of course, is the infection.

“Felix.” When Sylvain says it, it sounds immeasurable. Like the bottomless depths of the sea beneath _the Venatio._ As much as Felix might like to think he can decipher Sylvain, even he can’t detect what emotion laces his voice. It sounds almost like relief. It sounds a little like longing, too. “What are you doing here?”

Leonie is on the man before Felix can say anything else. “Come on, Gautier.” Felix doesn’t miss the way Sylvain’s eyes shut tightly at the name. “Get a move on. We don’t trust your father not to make a move before we depart.”

The tossing of four bodies is awkward, and there’s the joining of limbs as they parade through the stone hallways. Sylvain says nothing, and neither does Felix. He can feel the other man’s eyes on him though, tracing the nape of his neck and the fine hairs that have slipped loose from his ponytail. He tries to ignore the way familiar eyes make his skin flush with an indiscernible heat.

It’s only once they’re out does Sylvain speak. He’s still being pushed harshly along, a hand between shoulder blades and a violent shove that insinuates to simply _walk faster._ “Nice to see you three again!” The merriment in his tone is falsely provoked, and Felix can sense the worry behind it.

“Shut up.” The remark comes from Leonie. Felix stays silent, and Balthus offers a hearty laugh.

“It’s your lucky day, bud. Don’t know why Captain changed her mind, but I’m sure she’s got something in store for you!” Felix is sure Balthus doesn’t mean it maliciously. But it comes out foreboding regardless, and Sylvain swallows.

Felix moves closer to the vigilante, but he doesn’t talk. Even when he feels Sylvain’s stare boring into his side.

Sylvain tries to chuckle, but it comes out strained. “Taking me back to your ship, huh? A beauty she is. Why the change in heart, hm?”

Leonie simply grunts. “Fraldarius said you’d provide useful. I have some ideas for you, Gautier.”

Felix wishes she hadn’t said that. Because immediately Sylvain’s squirming in surprise, and Felix can nearly sense the widening of eyes. “He said that, huh? What else did he say?”

There’s a cluck from Leonie that serves as a wordless signal, and Balthus immediately shoves Sylvain’s shoulder blades again with the barrel of his gun. “Captain asked you to stop talking, friend. You should listen to her.”

The only thing Sylvain does is give a strained grunt in agreeance. Somewhere, Felix feels almost bad. He doesn’t though. There’s no real reason to be. He tries to tell himself the only reason he’s brought Sylvain back is to offer the crew with another prized member.

No one else talks the rest of the way. When they reach _the Venatio,_ Sylvain is given a hammock to be strung and a briefing Felix remembers well. It’s the same one he’d been given five years ago. Sylvain would do well to keep it in mind.

Felix is sure he will. Felix has always believed in Sylvain, even if he’d like to say he hasn’t.

There’s so much to say, and yet so little words make their way forth. It’s not the kind of silence that once filled their evenings by the shore. This one is heavy, and it’s filled with unspoken confessions and woes that refuse to budge.

He’s sitting in the quarters. Sylvain is across from him, albeit on the other side entirely of the barracks. There are only eight feet stretched between them, but it feels like several kilometres worth. Felix doesn’t think he’s ever felt so distant from the man before. Even when he was visiting other continents entirely.

When he speaks, it’s quiet, and halting, and Felix almost doesn’t say it. “I didn’t forget, you know.”

It takes a while for hazel eyes to meet him. But Sylvain’s stare is solid, unwavering, and when he talks it is laced with a thousand words that neither can say. “What do you mean?”

A swallow. “Our promise.”

The silence stretches on.

Felix tries again. “When I said I’d protect you.”

Sylvain stirs, and his gaze drops. He’s staring with intent at a speck of dirt on the floor. It might be dried blood; Felix isn’t sure anymore. “I thought you would have forgotten about that.”

There’s a scoff, and it’s louder than intended. When Felix’s bottom lip curls, he makes sure Sylvain sees it. “Don’t mistake me for a fool. Of course I remembered, idiot.” Felix averts his gaze. Suddenly the room seems suffocating, and he wants to snap at Sylvain to stop staring. “Why do you think I came back for you?”

He almost yells at Sylvain to say something, _anything._ That look of vulnerability that’s being replaced soon enough with imperviousness makes his throat tighten. “Well,” Sylvain says smoothly. “I didn’t take you as the sentimental type, Felix.” That grin he’s wearing is false. Felix doesn’t need to say it for Sylvain to know he’s detected the fictitiousness. It falters.

“Tell me what you really think.”

“That is what I think.”

“You’re a disgusting liar, Sylvain.”

The laugh that fills the air is bitter. Felix can practically taste the longing that’s slathered pitifully upon it. “Only with you, Fraldarius.” When Sylvain’s chortling dies down, all that’s left is an intangible look and what appears to be quiet sadness. “Only with you.”

Sometimes, Felix imagines he can understand what Sylvain is thinking. There’s a lot of self-loathing in that mind of his. Felix can’t exactly blame him – his own mind, too, is filled with these thoughts. And he’s certain that somewhere, in that empty cavern, there’s a small boy who doesn’t believe the idea that anyone would ever come to his rescue.

It’s also precisely why Felix is nearly certain Sylvain had thought he’d been taken back as a hostage. What more could he have use for onboard _the Venatio_? The idea of a man who once left him for the treasure of foreign lands coming back in his aid was hardly ideal.

In the end, Felix doesn’t blame Sylvain. He’d be surprised too.

_I didn’t mean to leave you there_. It’s what he means to say, but instead, Felix says this: “We should sleep.”

_I would have waited for you, even if you hadn’t come._ Sylvain smiles. “I think we should.”

_Always?_ Felix grabs the edge of his hammock, hoists himself up. “Night.”

_Always._ “Goodnight, Felix.”

_That’s a dangerous game, you know._ The oil lamp is smothered.

Fhirdiad is located several days away, on foot. But they’re travelling by ship, and the winding inner canals are hard to decipher and even harder to squeeze through. It doubles their journey, and despite Felix’s impatience, there’s a part of him that doesn’t mind. Especially when he gets to see how Sylvain fits in with the rest of the crew.

He doesn’t have an actual role onboard the ship yet. But Felix finds him in the galley with Ashe, or in the infirmary with Mercedes. Fe is sure much of it has to do with their personalities and not so much colliding interests, but it is what it is. As long as Sylvain’s found comfort in several members. And as much as he hates to admit it, it puts several anxieties to rest for Felix.

Perhaps the strangest relationship that’s bloomed from Sylvain’s stay aboard _the Venatio_ is his interactions with Constance. Felix doesn’t understand it, and he doesn’t think he ever will. The woman is strange, keeps to the shadows than the open skies, and oftentimes is too loud for the gunner to properly handle.

Sylvain likes her though. He says it has to do with her interesting personality. Felix sees nothing interesting about it.

Five days pass. They’re reaching the halfway mark in their journey now, and perhaps what’s most terrifying about it is Sylvain Gautier. Felix is the last to admit it, but now that he’s here, on the outer decks with a cutlass in his lap and a whetstone in his gloved palm, it’s clear there’s a storm lurking underneath his heavy-set mask.

Imperceptibly, Sylvain picks up on it.

“What are you thinking?” When he talks, it’s quiet, but Felix can’t tell the difference. The man’s voice could drown out the sea entirely.

“Nothing.” Felix goes back to sharpening his blade meticulously, staring at his half reflection that glares back with an unmatched rivalry.

“I don’t believe you.” Sylvain shifts. It’s such a subtle movement, but Felix detects it. Sandalwood and brine and the smell of Ashe’s dinner grub reach his nose. Somehow, it’s comforting. Felix doesn’t know why.

There’s a sniff of disdain. “Of course you don’t.” When Felix puts down his whetstone, it’s several minutes later. There’s been no other chatter, and when he looks up, Sylvain is staring at him.

If Felix were someone else, Sylvain would have probably offered a hand. Maybe clasped his thigh, if he were brave. Fe doesn’t know why the thought seems almost bearable. “You can talk to me, you know.” There’s something else hanging on to the end of his sentence, one Fe doesn’t need to pry for. They both know it begins with _We’re_ and ends with _friends._

Are they, though?

“You don’t need to worry about me.” Felix presses thin lips into a sharp line, impenetrable and withholding secrets. “I was thinking of… the port.” He refuses to call it home. Neither of them ever viewed it as one. Why would they now?

“Ah.” Sylvain goes silent again, and when the gunner looks up, he’s no longer staring. Instead, hazel eyes are turned upwards to the stars overhead. “Felix.” The man’s voice is careful, steady. “I don’t pretend to know what you’re thinking about.”

“Of course you don’t. It would be foolish to do so.”

“But I still wonder if you regret this path.”

The words come as a surprise, like a bullet that’s lodged itself straight through his heart. It’s not something he’s thought of before. Sylvain is wrong. And the more he does think of it, the more uncertain he is. At first, Felix almost says no. It would be easier that way, wouldn’t it? A life of pain and yearning and sore lessons gone out the window. He’s sure it would leave whatever game they’ve been playing the past few days at a grinding halt. Sylvain would be left in the dark once again, and Felix, despite himself, would learn to not feel bad about it.

Instead, he says, “do you think I’ve changed?” When Sylvain does not answer, Felix purses his lips. “I wonder how bloodthirsty I have become. Do you see that in me now? I fear I have become just as bad as the war itself. I am sure I’ve claimed a bountiful amount of bodies.”

Silence.

Felix looks to Sylvain. Sylvain isn’t staring at him, has his head turned in the opposite direction. So the gunner stands, sheathes his cutlass. In his mind, there was no need to discuss the woes of the soul with one who refused to acknowledge them.

He plans to leave. Except, somehow, for some reason, there’s a series of events that unfolds. It goes something like this:

Felix says goodbye. Sylvain does not answer. And for the briefest moment, leathered fingers brush a shoulder. It’s barely there, barely imperceptible. But still, Sylvain stiffens, and Felix feels himself go rigid as well.

The gunner makes his departure, and the vigilante is left alone once more.


	6. vi. hold the mirror up to show me what I chose

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adjusting to life on The Venatio is difficult, at first, but Sylvain makes do.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i really enjoyed writing this chapter - i hope you do too!

He hallucinated it. He must have. Sylvain stands in a stunned silence, mouth slightly agape as he tries to process what just happened. There’s no way that Felix would touch him of his own volition, and surely not for something so tender and unnecessary as this. Were it a life or death situation, Sylvain could imagine Felix touching him, if only to save him, but like this, when it’s casual? 

It’s unthinkable.

Still, there is no denying the phantom press of fingers against his shoulder, or the way Felix has paused half a second before doing so. It has been deliberate and purposeful, and Sylvain has no idea what it means.

Even worse, he has no idea how to make Felix do it again.

-

The days after Sylvain boards _The Venatio_ for the second time are strangely peaceful. There’s new people to meet, and although Sylvain is filled with trepidation at the concept of fitting in amongst this already tight-knit community, it’s nice to meet people that don’t have any expectations of him.

Balthus and Raphael are perhaps the easiest to get along with, despite the fact that Balthus was the one that had marched him so handily off the ship in the first place. The morning after Sylvain was taken back to the ship, Balthus had come up, clapped him on the shoulder, and called him a good man. That was the extent of the conversation. Since then, they’ve had no problems working together. 

Friendships with the others comes more slowly. The easiest is perhaps Ingrid, who Sylvain immediately falls into an easy rhythm with. Being around her almost feels like he’s known her his whole life, and he takes to working with her whenever he can. That evolves into a camaraderie with Constance that’s borne mostly of teasing Ingrid for the way that she eats or does pretty much anything.

“You know,” she says to him one day, tilting her nose upwards in that perfectly sophisticated way she has about her. “I was a noble once too.”

“Were you now?” Sylvain does a piss-poor job at acting surprised. It’s obvious though, from the way that Constance holds her silverware to her manner of speech. Everything about her screams nobility. 

She flicks a ringlet over her shoulder. “Yes. A long time ago.”

“What did your family do?”

“Oh, nothing exciting.” She keeps cleaning the blunderbuss in her lap, her demeanor and words casual despite the violent weapon in her hands. “We were merchants, really. We didn’t own a port or anything, but we helped organize shipment orders.” Her hands still, and when he glances over at her, she has a faraway expression on her face. “They died many years ago.”

Sylvain swallows. “I’m sorry. That’s hard.”

Constance sighs, looking down at her hands before getting back to work. “Family is complicated, Sylvain. _The Venatio_ is my family now.” Her eyes narrow. “I trust you're smart enough to know that if you hurt them, there will be hell to pay.”

He hadn’t expected this to turn into a shovel talk. “Right. Of course. I understand.”

“Good.” She sets the blunderbuss to the side, then tucks both sides of her hair behind her ears. Constance sighs. “ _The Venatio_ could be your family too, if you allowed it to be so.”

Sylvain stiffens. “I think I need to work on repaying the debt I owe all of you for coming back for me first.”

Constance sniffs. “I think you should be less concerned with what you think you need and more fixated on what you want.”

Sylvan grimaces. “What do you want?”

She looks up at him, a surprisingly peaceful expression on her face. “I want those who hurt my family dead and I want to succeed in spite of them. It’s not really anything complicated.”

Despite their burgeoning friendship, Sylvain can’t help but hate Constance a little in that moment. “I don’t think what I want is any of your concern.”

She laughs, high and shrill and incredibly obnoxious. “You can be mad at me all you like. Just so long as you admit that you have no idea where your life is going!” She flounces off before he can snap something cruel at her, instead leaving him scowling in her wake.

-

“You asked to see me?” Sylvain lets himself into Leonie’s cabin, shutting the door carefully behind him.

“Captain,” Leonie replies.

“Huh?”

“You asked to see me, Captain.” Leonie is already annoyed, which can’t bode well for his fate. “If you’re going to be on my ship, you’re going to treat me with respect.”

“Oh. Right. Of course. Captain.” Sylvain winces at the way the words bunch up in his throat, coming out stilted and unconnected.

Leonie sighs. “That’s a start, I guess.” She brushes her bangs out of her face, then leans back in her chair and rests her feet on the desk. “Now, we have more important things to discuss than your appalling lack of decorum.”

Sylvain nods, looking around the room uncomfortably. The Captain’s Quarters are small, and would be almost intimate if it weren’t for the fact that it’s clearly Leonie’s space that she has graciously allowed the rest of them into. It’s a bit of a mess, if he’s being completely honest. There are projects that are clearly half-finished - partially mended shirts and frayed ropes in need of repairing. Leonie is frugal, as far as captains go, and Sylvain can’t help but admire her commitment to keeping everything in working condition for as long as possible.

There are two chairs across from her desk, but they’re both covered in papers and weapons, and so Sylvain elects to stand. No reason to make Leonie any more angry with him, after all. “Right,” he says. “Like?”

She sighs. There’s disappointment laced throughout it, and it already feels familiar. He gets the feeling that Leonie is going to be disappointed in him a lot. “We need to talk about your role on this ship.”

“Of course.” Sylvain doesn’t know why he ever thought this meeting could be about anything else. He’s just been drifting around from assignment to assignment, helping where they could use an extra hand. It’s been great for getting to know the whole crew, but hasn’t done much at all to improve his position or standing as part of it.

“Well?” Leonie raises an eyebrow. “What are you good at?”

What _is_ Sylvain good at? Sleeping around, lying to people who he loves, lying to people who he hates. Lying in general. Being a scoundrel. For a while, he was good at being a vigilante, and there was some kind of honor to be found in that, in killing the corrupt and uplifting the subjugated.

But now, it seems that he’s not good at anything. He shrugs, smiling easily at Leonie. “Oh, I’m kind of a jack of all trades. Whatever you need done, I’ll do.”

She rolls her eyes. “Sure you are. Felix said you knew how to navigate.”

Goddess, he’d forgotten that Felix even knew that. “Yeah, I’m pretty good.” He scratches at the back of his neck. “You already have someone for that though, don’t you?”

“Not exactly,” Leonie admits. “We lost our old navigator right before we first landed in Port Gautier. I’ve been doing the majority of the navigation, but it’s getting old.”

He nods slowly. “Right. And you trust that I’m good enough based off of nothing but Felix’s word?”

“Fraldarius wouldn’t lie,” she says dismissively. “I wouldn’t trust him with my life, but at least he’s honest about it.” 

Funny. Felix has always been trustworthy to Sylvain. “I see.” There’s a long pause, and Sylvain can’t decide if Leonie’s piercing, almost bored gaze means that he’s dismissed or not. Finally, he gives into temptation and speaks. “Why did you come back for me?”

She lets out a single, harsh bark of laughter, leaning back in her chair and crossing her arms. “Fraldarius didn’t tell you?”

Sylvain shakes his head.

“He’s the one who wanted to go back for you. You wouldn’t be here if not for him.”

Sylvain can’t help it; he flinches. Mentally, he curses himself for not being in better control. He shouldn’t show weakness like this. Idiot. “He never said anything.”

“Hmph.” Leonie drops her feet off of the desk, letting them land on the floor with a heavy thump. “You know what that means, don’t you?”

That Felix might, against all odds, still harbor some feeling of friendship for Sylvain. “No.”

She leans forward, resting her elbows on the desk and fixing him with a piercing gaze. “As far as I’m concerned, you’re his problem. If something happens to him because of you, I’ll kill you.”

-

For all that Sylvain is grateful to be aboard _The Venatio,_ there are plenty of things he misses. A pretty girl to soothe away his worries. A fresh cut of meat. A real bed. Solitude.

The last one, at least, is partially fixable. He can't have the solitude that he can find on a lonely rooftop or the anonymity of a random bar, but he can at least press himself against the bow of the ship and look out over an infinite ocean.

It’s such that kind of night tonight, and Sylvain can’t decide if he truly wants to be alone or not. A nightmare had woken him - the usual sort of thing, really. Typical stuff. Miklan’s face, his father’s expectations, the sting of rough ground against his cheek. 

Were he back home - no, back at Port Gautier - he probably would have drowned his sorrows in a friendly face by now. Instead, he’s left alone with his thoughts. Maybe it’s good, to have some sort of introspection.To mull over his choices and circumstances, so to speak.

He’d rather have a warm body next to him, if he’s being honest.

Sylvain sighs, tipping his head up to look at the stars. At the very least, these are the same here. He’d been taught the constellations as a boy, and even now he can remember the names. Areadbhar. Amyr. Failnaught.

He used to climb onto the roof of house Gautier and look at them, imagining himself somewhere far away with only them for company. Now that he’s succeeded in that dream, it almost feels lonely. He can talk to the stars as much as he wishes, but they’ll never talk back.

“Can’t sleep?”

Felix’s voice cuts through the still night air like a knife, as harsh in speech as he is in battle.

Sylvain starts, pulling his gaze almost shamefully back down to the ship and turning to look at Felix. The other man is barely visible in the darkness, only the whites of his eyes reflecting back at Sylvain.

“No. I take it you can’t either?”

Felix grunts. “No.” He steps up next to Sylvain, following his gaze up at the stars. “Do you really think the stories are true?”

Sylvain tips his head back as far as it can go, so that his vision is filled with a sky full of stars and nothing else. Out here, they seem to shine brighter, as though they too just needed to get out of Port Gautier once and for all to truly thrive.

“Nah, probably not,” he says. “Still, it’s nice to think about all those legends, up there looking down on us. Makes you feel a little less alone, you know?”

A pause.

Sylvain brings his gaze back down to earth and looks over at Felix, just in time to see Felix cut his eyes away. “Yeah,” Felix replies. “You could say that.”

There are words on the tip of Sylvain’s tongue, ones that he would say if it were anyone other than Felix. The confession lies too out of reach, both too honest and too false.

It’s funny, how he feels most like a liar when he’s around Felix but also like he’s being the most honest he’s ever been. The dichotomy is unfathomable and impossible to understand.

“Are you?” Sylvain says instead. “Alone?”

Felix’s breath hitches. It’s subtle, and if Sylvain weren’t paying close attention he doubts he would have heard it at all. “No.” When Felix replies, it’s so quiet that Sylvain almost doesn't hear him, his answer nearly lost to the sea.

Sylvain swallows, about to continue, when Felix looks up and fixes him with a piercing stare. “Neither are you, so stop feeling so damn sorry for yourself.”

It’s a very Felix way to tell him that he cares, and Sylvain smiles before he can help it. “Right. About that. I wanted to thank you, for coming back for me.”

Anything teasing and light in Felix’s posture vanishes as he straightens abruptly, almost as though he’s a puppet that’s suddenly been pulled upright. “Don’t,” he snaps. “Don’t say shit like that.”

“Felix,” Sylvain starts to speak, but Felix shakes his head emphatically.

“Don’t.” Even in the dim light, Sylvain can see his jaw working. “I shouldn’t have left you,” Felix isn’t looking at him as he speaks, but Sylvain can hear the emotion in his voice nonetheless.

Sylvain’s breath stutters in his chest, and he grips at his sleeve with a hand, holding himself tightly as though he’ll disintegrate otherwise. “It’s fine,” he says. He sounds neutral. Good. He hasn’t lost his composure yet.

“Listen,” Felix snaps.

Against all odds, Sylvain does, snapping his mouth shut and straightening slightly.

“I’m not going to tell you again,” Felix says firmly. “So pay attention.”

Sylvain nods, his heart pounding away in his chest. Traitorous thing, so eager for any bit of Felix’s attention. If only he had more control over it.

Felix’s mouth twists, almost as though he’s dreading his own words, but he forges on regardless. If this were anyone else, Sylvain would have spared them the words and clapped a hand on their shoulder, saying that he understands with his hands instead of his words. But this is Felix, and any touch is a cruelty. So instead, his hands hang uselessly by his side, and he waits.

“I’m. Sorry.” Felix’s eyes dart out to start at the darkness of the sea. “I shouldn’t have left you at all. You don’t deserve to be back in that house. For anything.”

Sylvain presses his lips together to try to stop the flood of emotion from drowning him. “Thank you,” he says at last. “It’s fine, Felix. Really. No hard feelings.”

Felix nods slowly, and Sylvain smiles at him. “I’m going to try to sleep. I’ll talk to you in the morning.” His fingers twitch, and he gathers what scant remains of his courage life has left him with and reaches a hand out as he leaves. His fingertips barely touch the back of Felix’s coat, soft enough that the tough could be dismissed if Felix wanted.

Felix stiffens, and Sylvain withdraws quickly, rushing downstairs like the coward he is.

-

Sylain wakes to the sound of bells. For a brief, terrible moment he thinks he’s back in Port Gautier, trapped in his room, and that everything that’s happened recently has been a simple dream. The thought sends him jolting awake, sitting up bolt upright in his hammock. The swaying of a ship is unmistakable when measured against a solid building, and he breathes a sigh of relief as the ship gently rocks in time with the waves.

Sylvain rolls out of his hammock, nodding at Annette and falling into step beside her as they climb up to the main deck. “I thought we weren’t going to reach Fhirdiard until tomorrow.”

Annette shrugs. “The winds were cooperative.”

“Right,” Sylvain says, casting his gaze about for Felix. The gunner is nowhere to be seen, and Sylvain sighs and drifts after Annette, helping her check the rigging of the ship. In the distance, the city can be seen, and despite knowing that it’s not Port Gautier, Sylvain’s stomach clenches in something akin to fear. 

“How long do you think we’ll be in town?”

“Ummm,” Annette frowns, pausing in the midst of tying a knot. “Not too long, I don’t think. Just a couple days, if that. We’re here for the rally and for the Captain to get any new orders. Shouldn’t be long!” She turns her large, too-shrewd eyes on him. “Are you alright, Sylvain?”

He beams down at her. “I’m great! Happy to be here!” Sylvain looks out at the city, picking out the spire of the church that woke him this morning. “I’m just… a little on edge. Nothing to worry about.” The bell tolls again, louder this time. The sound feels like it reverberates through Sylvain’s skull, and he shivers as he looks out over the city.

It’s eerie, and quiet in the early morning. The bell stops eventually, but Sylvain hears the ringing every time he closes his eyes for the rest of the day.

**Author's Note:**

> a privateer fic that's been in the works for a long time now between sydney [apastron/snowgirl] and i [seraphicangels]. as it stands right now, each chapter will rotate between us. i will be writing chapters that fall under felix's POV, while she writes the chapters that fall under sylvain's POV!
> 
> as always, thank you so much for reading! you can find us respectively @fraldarian on twitter and @edelgardlesbian on twitter.


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